March 7, 2003

MGH to participate in smallpox vaccination plan

While the Boston Public Health Commission's (BPHC) smallpox vaccination program began last week with the inoculation of nine public health response team members, the MGH has started its own preparations to be part of the BPHC's federally guided program. The MGH will be the designated site for the Phase 1A implementation of the BPHC's program. To inform MGHers about the hospital's plan, several smallpox information sessions were held at the hospital this week, led by David Hooper, MD, chief of the MGH Infection Control Unit.

In these information sessions, Hooper outlined what is involved in giving and receiving the vaccination, what the possible side effects are, medical liability for illness caused by vaccination, the city and statewide plans for vaccinating health care workers and how the MGH's participation coordinates with those plans.

According to Hooper, the city of Boston currently is in Phase 1A of what is called the "pre-event" smallpox vaccination program. This includes health care workers — mostly consisting of physicians and nurses who work in
— MGH smallpox vaccination plan emergency services and intensive care units who volunteer to be a part of the first public health response teams. The goals of Phase 1A are to train health care workers to vaccinate others and to handle any potential issues of side effects from the vaccine. Approximately 10 volunteers are expected to be vaccinated at each acute care hospital in this phase, which includes half-day sessions March 10, 26, 27, 31 and April 1 and 2. Phase 1B, which will begin in April, will include the vaccination of additional volunteer health care workers — approximately 150 at the MGH.

"We have been working with the other Partners hospitals, along with city, state and federal officials to develop a thoughtful approach to this unprecedented national initiative," says Hooper. "In developing this plan, there have been a variety of challenging issues to address, such as patient and provider safety, liability and employee benefit plans. While all of the details are being worked out, we are committed to assuring the proper balance of public health needs and the needs and safety of our employees and patients."

Additional MGH information sessions are being planned in the coming weeks and will be announced through MGH broadcast e-mail. A video of one of these information sessions also will be available in the Blum Patient and Family Learning Center beginning March 10.For more information about smallpox, visit BPHC's
website at http://www.bphc.org/.